We hear it all the time:JOE BUCK HATES THE YANKEESOr does Joe Buck love the Yankees. He also hates the Phillies. Joe Buck also hates the Red Sox. In fact Joe Buck hates all of baseball; in fact he hates everybody. The truth is, Joe Buck does not hate the Yankees. But Yankees fans feel that he does whenever he criticizes them, which is his job if they do something that should be criticized. That is the broadcaster's job. But why do people think Joe Buck hates their team. It's because fans are used to their local announcers, who are very often fans of their team. So they get used to those guys (those guys?) being homers that when they get announcers that are not homers towards that team, it seems like that announcer hate that team. IUt makes sense if you think about it. Bob Costas said this when on the Michael Kay Show. He mentioned that during the 1997 World Series b/w the Indians and the Marlins, that NBC got calls from fans of both teams saying that the announcers (Costas, the great Bob Uecker, the not so great Joe Morgan) were biased towards the other team. Speaking of Michael Kay, he is the reason why Yankee fans (and yes I am a Yankees fan) think Joe Buck hates the Yanks. Michael Kay does the play by play for the Yankees and does a terrible job. And he is such a complete homer towards the Yankees. So are the radio announcers John Sterling and that thing that is Suzyn Waldman. In fact most local announcers are biased towards their team. So when the games are nationally televised, the announcers are very rarely the same as the local announcers, are not as familiar with the teams as the local guys are, and are not as homerish (is that a word?) as the locals are. In fact I recently asked a fellow Yankee fan who was distraught that I like Joe Buck, which I do (he isn't Vin Scully, his old man the late, great Jack Buck, or even as good as Jon Miller, who I think is the best right now.) And he saws that Joe Buck hates the Yankees, I then ask him "how so?" He did not give me an answer.And I'm not the only one who thinks the criticism against Joe Buck is b.s.-http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/sports/Do-Joe-Buck-and-Tim-McCarver-Hate-the-Yankees-66947112.html-http://fackyouk.blogspot.com/2009/10/joe-buck-hates-yankees.htmlIN FACT, I DARE THE 2 READERS OF THIS BLOG (I do wish it was more but w/e) TO PROVE ME WRONG. IF SOMEBODY CAN PROVE THAT JOE BUCK DOES HATE THE YANKEES THEN I WILL EAT MY WORDS.

Some of my favorites
"HOMEY DON'T PLAY THAT"
"I JUST ATE HIS LIVER"
"WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE"
"MIKE BIBBY BE FLOPPIN"
"BOW TO YOUR SENSEI"
"CAROL HOLD MY CALLS"
"I AIN'T GOT TIME TO BLEED"
"THAT MY FRIEND IS HOW YOU GET PINK EYE"
"WE NEED OUR THUMB TO GO IN THIS DIRECTION"

Some of my favorites
"I AM AN FBI AGENT"
"TIME TO MAKE THE DONUTS"
"I'M ON A HORSE"
"PANTS ON THE GROUND"
"I ALREADY WORK AROUND THE CLOCK"
"WE GOT A BROKEN ARROW HERE"
"STOP LOOKING AT ME SWAN"
"IT'S IN THE HOLE"
"STRAIGHT CASH, HOMEY"
"YOU ARE NOT THE FATHER"
I mean this guy is not Doc Emrick or Gary Thorne, and some might refer to him as a clown, but at least he makes the game fun. Kudos, Mr. Moller.

18 May 2010

The Washington Wizards have won the right to select John Wall with the number one overall selection. And while they were awful, there were teams much, much worse. Those teams needed the number one much more than the Wizards did. But of course they did not get. Why is that?Because the NBA Lottery is a load of crap. First off, there is way too many teams in the lottery to begin with. The Toronto Raptors and the Houston Rockets really do not need to be in the lottery, they just missed the playoffs. Why teams that just miss the playoffs have any shot of winning the lottery is a joke. For example, the Bulls won the lottery to take Derrick Rose in 2008 despite not being a terrible team, unlike the Heat or the Timberwolves of that year. So the Bulls were able to reload quickly and now they are a team one big piece away from being a title contender, while the T'Wolves are still terrible. The Draft Lottery should be just 3 teams, unless more than 3 won less than 20 games, in that case they would all be in the lottery. The NBA Draft should allow the worst teams get better, not allow the decent teams to get even better while the bad teams don't get a fair shake.

17 May 2010

Some are in favor of it. Some are not. But the fact is that it is very likely that Super Bowl XLVII will be held at the new Meadowlands Stadium in beautiful East Rutherford, New Jersey, in the shadow of New York City.
The NFL is waving the rule that Super Bowl venues have a minimum of 50 degrees on the field, with roof or not, for this one time only. So you will not be seeing the Super Bowl in Buffalo or Green Bay anytime soon. But this will certainty make some history, being the first cold, outdoor Super Bowl site, with the stadium being home to one of the oldest teams in the NFL and the other one a founding member of the AFL.
For those against having a Super Bowl in Northern Jersey because it is cold, that is a valid argument. I have lived about 30 minutes from the Meadowlands for my whole life and it is very frigid in early February (it was around freezing for this year's Super Bowl). But they have played Super Bowls in Minneapolis and Detroit, even though those were in domed stadiums. And let's not forget how crappy the weather was for Super Bowl XVI. And nobody would ever forget a Super Bowl played in the snow. That alone would be historic.UPDATE:The Super Bowl is coming to the Garden State.

According to stories from a variety of sources, the Nationals are actually considering drafting somebody other than "Baseball's LeBron." And if they do not pick Bryce Harper, they will be making a mistake of epic proportions.Bryce Harper is not a guy you pass on. When the New York Times calls you the Next Sure Thing, that means something. He is considered to be one of the best power-hitting prospects in years, possibly since Number 7. Who cares is he is a little cocky. When you are put on the cover of Sports Illustrated when you are a high school sophomore being calling baseball's version of LeBron James, you will be cocky. Will he cost a lot of money, absolutely. But so did Stephen Strasburg and in my opinion Harper is a better prospect than Strasburg was. And Strasburg was one of the best pitching prospects in a long time. If the Nationals could put together a team of Bryce Harper and Stephen Strasburg they would be a force to be reckoned with in Major League Baseball. Therefore it is shocking the the Natinals is actually considering drafting somebody else. That is not something they can do. Harper is a once in a lifetime type of prospect and is not somebody you pass on. If the Nationals' general manager does not want to be known as that guy who looks like the Piano Man he makes that selection.While I do think this is a bluff, I have not been surprised by anything in the MLB over the last couple of years.